This year marks the silver anniversary of the barn-storming acoustic country music juggernaut known as Old Crow Medicine Show. They’re a group that traces their roots to busking all across Canada and the United States. Since then, Old Crow Medicine Show has gained commercial success with their distinctively contemporary spin on old-school traditions. The band’s song “Wagon Wheel” became certified Platinum in 2013, and is one of the best-known and most covered songs of this century. Old Crow Medicine Show’s 25th anniversary is being celebrated in Summer 2023 with the release of the band’s 10th studio album, Jubilee.
Founding member Ketch Secor has remained a constant of the band through the last 25 years, and remains the band’s lead singer, songwriter, and fiddle player. In his early childhood years, Ketch’s parents moved him around the country, opening up a series of schools in many different pockets of the United States. It awoke in him a lifelong love of travelling and learning. As a teen, he earned a scholarship to an illustrious prep school in New England—which is where he first got serious about old-time string band music.
Ketch Secor and three other members of Old Crow Medicine Show dropped by CKUA’s Edmonton studios just ahead of their headlining set at the 2023 Edmonton Folk Music Festival. They gathered around a single vintage microphone to share live renditions of two songs from Jubilee. Additionally, Ketch joins CKUA’s Grant Stovel for an in-depth conversation that’s just as wide-ranging, authentic, and full of delightful surprises as the band’s music.
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Producer: Scott Zielsdorf | Session Engineer: Brendan Cross | Host: Grant Stovel | Graphics: Shaun Friesen | Music: Doug Hoyer
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